Create a word picture of the content of your blog at Wordle. Like a tag cloud but with colors, and it’s editable. Here’s mine.

This blog is focused on North Central Phoenix, where I live, work, and grew up. So the What You Get for the Money series will include only the ZIP code areas of 85020, 85022, 85024, 85028, 85032, and 85050. You can see these on a ZIP code map here http://maps.huge.info/zip.htm and here http://www.dreimaz.com/phoenix-zip-map2.pdf

Price Band $2,000,000 Plus

North Central Phoenix isn’t hoity toity. As of this writing, there are a mere 88 properties currently for sale in the entire city of Phoenix that are listed at $2M and higher. Contrast that with Scottsdale where you’ll find 632 homes to choose from in this price range or the geographically small town of Paradise Valley which boasts 292 homes above $2M.

In my ZIPs, 7 homes are listed at $2M or higher. Here, $2,000,000 buys you a big home. Of those for sale today, the average size is 5,800 square feet and most sit on about an acre of land. Pricing runs from $2.1M to $2.5M.

Four of the 7 homes on this For Sale map are located in the gated Tatum Foothills subdivision (numbers 1, 3, 4 & 6 on the map). This is a neighborhood of only 49 custom-built homes dating to the early 1990’s. They have vaulted coffered ceilings, vast kitchens with luxury finishes like cherrywood & slab granite, and often marble or travertine flooring. Backyard pool areas are large and lavish and some homes have truly beautiful mountain views. Don’t miss up the chance to click the link above to the Tatum Foothills HOA. It’s is too much fun to pass up! The HOA website shows a satellite map of the neighborhood with clickable links to multiple exterior photos of each of the 49 homes. Wow! That’s a proud HOA.

Beyond the luxury homes and beautiful views, a real drawing card of Tatum Foothills is that children here attend the “Three C’s” schools - Cherokee Elementary, Cocopah Middle, and Chaparral High - widely viewed as some of the best in the city. They’re actually in the Scottsdale School District, but these homes are situated to take advantage of the best views and the best schools, neatly wrapped up in sumptuous surroundings. You pay big bucks to live this life - between HOA dues ($3600/year, paid quarterly) and property taxes (avg $9000/yr) you’re shelling out $1,000 per month.

The other interesting home in this price band is the former home of Senator John McCain and his wife Cindy. It’s for sale (again!) for a whopping $12,000,000. Yikes! I hear Mike Myer’s Dr. Evil in my head as I type that - Twelve Meeeelllliooon Dollars!

This price seems simply silly. The curent owner bought it in Decmeber 2006 for $3,200,000. So in a 2-year stretch of time in which property values dropped about 10% Valleywide (and much much more in outlying towns like Surprise and Queen Creek), the McCain’s former home appreciated an astounding 400%!?  Hmmmmm.  Of course there’s the celebrity factor. And it is 14,000 square feet of livable space situated on just over 2 acres at Central & Glendale.

The home has obviously been  remodeled extensively since it was built in 1951. But it’s difficult to tell if the current owner did anything more than seal the patio pavers, because when Senator McCain’s Realtor had it listed, there were no interior pictures. The descriptive text used by the current Realtor is a word-for-word copy of that used in 2006 by McCain’s agent. Again, hmmmm.

Finally, it is worth noting that house #2 on this list is being sold for its land value. It’s zoned PAD11 wth a potential for 16 multifamily units, per the listing agent. This is prime infill land located just south of Central & Butler and off the Arizona Canal. Will be interesting to see what goes there when the market recovers and small developers come back to our town. Luxury townhomes, anyone?

All in all though, $2,000,000 buys you a pretty nice pad in Phoenix. And of course it goes without saying that if you need help finding your $2M baby, I’m ready to step up. Call me for references.

We began last week with the market-bolstering news that Fannnie & Freddie could borrow at the Fed window if they needed to, and this gave mortgage rates a little boost (meaning they dropped). But by the end of last week, fears about inflation and a couple of negative economic reports took over the media space and mortgage rates closed the week generally up about .375 from where they began. 

News You Can Use Tip - When Bond prices move higher, home loan rates move lower…and vice versa.

The bad economic news last week was that the Producer Price Index soared to it’s highest year-over-year increase since 1981. Meanwhile, the Consumer Price Index rose to it’s highest year-over-year level since 1991. The Retail Sales Report was negative too, indicating that retail sales didn’t rise as much as forecasters expected. Seems those tax rebate checks aren’t going so far after all.

This week Thursday and Friday are the big econ news days. On Thursday expect the Jobless Claims report and Existing Home Sales numbers for June. Friday brings the release of the Consumer Sentiment Index and New Home Sales numbers. Forecasters are predicting a little bump in the wrong direction for all these numbers. Me? I’m with ‘em. I think we’ve got a few more months of bad news before we see the light at the end of the tunnel. The AP newswire backs that up.

You can sign up to receive weekly mortgage news from Kristi Collins, my favorite lender at Maricopa Mortgage. Email Kristi at “Kristi AT Marcopa Mortgage DOT com

You can view today’s mortgage rates online at CappMortgage. Or view the Arizona Mortgage Guru’s info-packed blog.

photo credit to MiamiAmia,  via StockExchange

A continuing weekly look at For Sale, Pending and Sold statistics by ZIP code (for the ZIPs in which I primarily work which includes 85020, 85022, 85024, 85028, 85032, and 85050). Check back on Sundays for a drill-down look into the numbers in your ZIP code. Have a North Phoenix area ZIP that doesn’t show up here? Email or call me and I’ll add it for you.

This week shows continued slow & steady improvement over last week. The PENDING numbers in every ZIP code covered are up, which is a great sign. The numbers of SOLD homes are up in all but 1 ZIP code, also a great sign.

However, we’re still nowhere near normal for most ZIPs. Most forecasters & Realtors agree that a 6 months supply of inventory is about “normal”. It’s interesting to note that 85024 is very close to that ideal. Sellers in 85024 - don’t despair! You’re near the bottom. Buyers wanting to get into 85024 - hurry up, it might not be a buyer’s market there for much longer.

I’m noticing an uptick in the number of roadside cardboard signs that have something to do with real estate lately. You know the kind - here in Phoenix they’re usually hand-inked, on cardboard or oak tag, stuck in the ground with a stake.

Surely it’s a function of the bad economy, the looming recession, the credit crisis and the housing ‘bubble’.  Whatever, I figured it would make a good blog post or two. Here’s today’s Real Estate Road Sign:

I didn’t call to find out exactly what scam they’re peddling, but rest assured it isn’t as good as it sounds. No one is going to pay off your mortgage out of the goodness of their heart and not expect something for it. Either they’ll refinance you under their own (probably dubious) terms, or they’ll pay off the mortgage and let you stay in it, as a tenant.

There are some instances where it might be beneficial to let someone buy your home from you and then arrange to stay in it as a tenant. But contact a trusted Realtor or mortgage lender to do it. Placing your single largest financial asset into the hands of someone who advertises on roadsides with hand lettered cardboard signs is not in your best interests.

If this is a refinancing “plan” it probably involves people who look and sound a lot like the Sopranos and there are a lot of other, better options for refinancing if you’re facing foreclosure.

If it’s a plan to buy your home and rent it back to you, be very careful. There are a lot of scams out there now that start out this way, and then whack you with huge penalties if your rent is even an hour late. Worse, some of those rent back to owner schemes allow the company you’re dealing with the evict you from your home without notice if you pay late.

If you’re having financial troubles large enough to even think about calling the number on this sign, you’re probably better off contacting someone about a refinance or a short sale.

Related Posts

1. Real Estate Road Signs - Buy A House with $500 Down
2. Hire a Professional Lender, Not Your Buddy Who Does Mortgages Part Time
3. How Your FICO Score Determines Your Mortgage Interest Rate by the XBroker (not light reading but highly worth your time)
4. The AZ Mortgage Guru updates the status of the federal housing assistance bill
5. Try the federal Hope Now campaign designed to help you stay in your home

In the local news, a Wall Street Journal piece on the death of Phoenix financier Scott Coles of Mortgages, Ltd.

US News and World Report offers a perspective I’ve been waiting to hear. The average Joe can’t predict whether a bank will fail. The experts can’t predict it! More importantly, the average Joe doesn’t need to predict that. Simply make sure your bank is on the list of FDIC insured institutions, then make sure you’ve got less than $100,000 in that bank (or $250,000 in a retirement account with that bank), and stop worrying.

Related Posts

• FDIC Shuts Down IndyMac Bank
• Bank Run at IndyMac
• IndyMac Goes Down (courtesy of the AZ Mortgage Guru)
• Did Senator Shumer Worsen IndyMac’s Woes? (courtesy of Realtor John Wake’s AZ Real Estate Notebook)

This is the 1st in what I hope & plan will be an ongoing series of posts about real estate price bands around North Phoenix. Essentially, I’m trying to answer the question I get from almost every out of towner who’s considering a metro Phoenix area real estate investment - “how much does it cost?”

This blog is focused on North Central Phoenix, where I live, work, and grew up. So the What You Get for the Money series will include only the ZIP code areas of 85020, 85022, 85024, 85028, 85032, and 85050. You can see these on a ZIP code map here http://maps.huge.info/zip.htm and here http://www.dreimaz.com/phoenix-zip-map2.pdf

Price Band $75,000 to $90,000
This is a challenging price band in almost every part of the metro Phoenix area, but especially so in the North Central Phoenix area (the ZIPs noted above).  In these postal codes, your dollar buys a smallish 1 or 2 bedroom condo.

In Phoenix, “condo” typically means it looks and feels like an apartment. These are usually 2-story stucco buildings, often with tile a roof. Usually, there are ground floor units and upstairs units, and about 4 to 16 units per building.

Most buyers and sellers think there’s a value attached to being on the upper floors (”no one above you” or “no one walking on your head” is common phrasing in the online ads). But it’s not a hard and fast rule that upstairs is “better”. I’ve had young singletons tell me they feel safer being upstairs, while buyers in their 40’s, 50’s and 60’s tell me they want something on the ground floor for easy access when they’re older and the old knees might go. Generally, having an end unit is also desirable, because only end units get light from windows on 2 sides of the condo.

Parking is usually a row of covered, assigned spots and you’re usually assigned only 1 spot. If you must have a garage in these ZIP codes, you’ll need to stretch your budget to at least the $175,000 to $200,000 range. Storage space is found in closets and cupbaords under staircases (aka “Harry Potter’s bedroom”). Many condos have balconies and/or patios with closets for additional storage.

Condo owners own space, not land, although in most condo complexes the individual owners jointly own the common area. The common area is where the postal boxes, pool, and any other amenities are located, as well as the streets, sidewalks and any landscaping.

Condo conversions are common in this price range. During the real estate boom of 2005-06 a lot of developers took older apartment buildings and turned them into condos, selling individual units and often making hefty profits. I’m no expert in building codes and so I hesitate to even write this, but I believe (?) that the building process is different for condos vs. apartments, and so the noiseproofing between neighbors is better in condos than in apartments. But everyone has their own limit for tolerating noise from the next door neighbors, so condo conversions aren’t necessarily bad, just different. (Any readers with authority on condo & apartment building codes? Please comment!)

At today’s writing, there are  17 properties for sale between $75,000 and $90,000. It’s important to note that of these 17, only 5 are not lender owned or short sales. They’re on a map and in a list below.

As you can see from the chart above, the spaces are small, 600 hundred to 1,100 square feet. I would normally say this price band buys you only 600 to 900 square feet, but with foreclosures pushing down prices, buyers might get a little more space for their dollar.

Below are some interior & exterior photos of properties typical to this price band.

The most popular financing in this price band is often an FHA loan. These loans allow buyers to put as little as 3% of the purchase price down. For cash strapped buyers, and especially for first time buyers, buying a small condo on an FHA loan can be a great launching pad to building real wealth.

First time buyers often combine an FHA loan with a Down Payment Assistance program. These allow the seller to contribute to the buyer’s down payment. You can read all about options for first time and cash-poor buyers here: http://northphoenixagent.wordpress.com/category/first-time-homebuyer/ and get some up to the minute advice on FHA loan program changes at The Arizona Mortgage Guru’s blog.

Shopping in this price band and want more info? I am happy to help you out! Just call and I’ll set you up with a custom MLS search that will email you whenever new listings hit the market that suit your needs.

People lined up twice around the block this morning at the Pasadena, California headquarters of IndyMac Bank. Folks were there to close their accounts and take the money to other banks. It was a old-fashioned bank run like we haven’t seen since the Depression.

Have you got money in an IndyMac account? There’s no need to panic, and no need to withdraw your funds from the bank either.

Yes, IndyMac failed. But the FDIC insures all bank deposits up to $100,000. Your money was insured by the US government. You’ll get it all back. In fact, it never went anywhere. Previous press releases have said that the ATMs are operational, the bank windows reopened this morning and folks with Indymac accounts under $100,000 (or retirement accounts under $250,000) have full access to their money. The only difference is that now the FDIC is running the bank. Essentially, it was nothing more than a management change.

Read the the Los Angeles Times today, on the IndyMac situation: “Customers with $100,000 or less in deposits or with $250,000 or less in a retirement account would have full access to their funds, which are insured by the federal government. . . . . For all depositors, interest rates on most individual accounts would remain unchanged until the accounts mature, the FDIC said.”

photo credit to MiamiAmia,  via StockExchange

This Sunday I’m beginning a new & ongoing series - weekly statistics by ZIP code (for the ZIPs in which I primarily work). Check back on Sundays for a drill-down look into the numbers of homes for sale, homes pending and homes recently sold, in your North Phoenix area ZIP code.

Click to enlarge image